The Importance Of Prison Life Of A Male Prison

For over centuries, the only form of punishment and discouragement for humans is through the prison system. Because of this, these humans or inmates, are sentenced to spend a significant part of their life in a confined, small room. With that being said, the prison life can leave a remarkable toll on the inmates life in many different categories. The first and arguably most important comes in the form of mental health. Living in prison with have a great impact on the psychological part of your life. For example, The prison life is a very much different way of life than what us “normal” humans are accustomed to living in our society. Once that inmate takes their first step inside their new society, their whole mindset on how to live and communicate changes. The inmate’s psychological beliefs about what is right and wrong are in questioned as well as everything else they learned in the outside world. In a way, prison is a never ending mind game you are playing against yourself with no chance of wining. Other than the mental aspect of prison, family plays a very important role in an inmate’s sentence. Family can be the “make it or break it” deal for a lot of inmates. It is often said that “when a person gets sentenced to prison, the whole family serves the sentence.” Well, for many inmates that is the exact case. While that prisoner serves their time behind bars, their family is on the outside waiting in anticipation for their loved ones to be released. In a way, the families

In this society, depending on the crime many people may view women in prison as people who should be kept off the streets, such as thugs, gang members, and women who are drug addicts. A big misunderstanding that people have is that they see them as a lost cause. However, through each of these stories you get to know each person and their life stories

Overall, the United States prison system and society’s view of African Americans needs to change. People need to make sure that the mistakes society has made in the past do not repeat themselves. In order to fix many of the existing problems it is important to focus on reforming the prison system. Doing so would prevent many future cases of injustice and racial

Although we would like to believe the world is not as racially charged in 2013 as it was in the 1960s, a look in our penal system would show that minorities are still arrested and incarcerated at a higher rate than whites. The United States has experienced a rise in its prison population over the last 40 years and our incarceration rate is nearly 5 times higher than any other country. Even though 13% of the US population are African American males, they make up 38% of the prison population. Contributing factors to these numbers are mandatory minimum sentences, high crime and poverty areas, and lack of rehabilitative resources within our system (p.77-78).

The third critical book review for this class takes a look at “The New Jim Crow” by Michelle Alexander published in 2012 by the New York Press. This book analyzes the problem with the incarceration system in the United States today that unfairly affects the African American community. This incarceration system is continuing to separate families, strip men of their freedom, and effectually make them into second class citizens upon release from prison as “free” men. She even describes that those who are convicted of these crimes are “relegated to a racially segregated and subordinated existence” (Pg. 4). Michelle Alexander is not only a published author but is also an active Civil Rights activist all while currently employed as an associate professor of law at Ohio State University. It is a very interesting read that coincides with where our class discussions have recently been. It argues that we as a country have not ended racial discrimination but just transformed it into a new type of caste system. It is an eye opening book that created an uncomfortable feeling while reading due to my level of ignorance on this topic prior to taking this class. I believe that this book will serve as an important narrative into fixing the race problems in this country because it brings to light what needs to be fixed. If any progress is made it will be because of books like this that expose the problems but starting to fix them will be the next step.

Though most citizens in the United States would agree that the prison system in the U.S. needs to be amended, do they see the prison system as a way to enforce the racial caste system? At first Michelle Alexander, the author of The New Jim Crow, did not see the prison systems as racially motivated until doing further research. After researching the issue, Alexander found the prison system was a way to oppress African Americans and wrote the novel The New Jim Crow. The New Jim Crow follows the history of the racial caste system and in the novel Alexander comes to the conclusion that the mass incarceration of African American is the New Jim Crow, or in other words a new system of black oppression. Though some might try to refute the idea of mass incarceration of African Americans, Alexander offers a well thought out argument with substantial evidence and data to compellingly link Jim Crow and mass incarceration and proves that it is an issue that should be on the radar of all U.S. citizens.

The disproportionate numbers of African Americans in the prison system is a very serious issue, which is not usually discussed in its totality. However, it is quite important to address the matter because it ultimately will have an effect on African Americans as a whole.

While African American males have been affected the most more than other demographic group within the criminal justice system, other minorities have also been unequally affected. Hispanics only account for 17% of the prison population nationally, even though they are only 12% of the total population in the United States. The statistics for these inequalities for African Americans can be identified

According to the United States Department of Justice as March 2014 there are approximately 39398 prisoners ,statewide , in Louisiana prisons and of that number 26,776 of the inmates are classified as African-American, of that number 94.4% are African American males which accounts for 25,277 male inmates in prisons (Le Blanc June 30, 2013). It has been said that, the etiology as it relates to African-American males, in the prison system, attended substandard schools that are not considered to be a safest environment, that the communities they grew up in are violent therefore, violence was witnessed on a day-to-day basis and it became a normal part of day-to-day life for these youth and they also became part of that cycle.

Davis reveals that race and gender has played a huge role in our nation 's history. What is very interesting is the fact that she takes these topics and goes with it in two totally different directions. She does elaborate the importance of how race and gender plays a massive role in her belief of prisons as sites of massive inequality but she casts a much broader light on other things. The function and pure nature of the prison system is also shaped in a questionable way. This also shines light towards our society that relies so heavily on incarceration. The discussion is then shifted away from questions about crime and punishment and toward concerns for social justice and human rights. The racial aspects of her findings will largely be familiar to anyone who has thought seriously about prisons before the excess

Within the chapter “How Gender Structures the prison system” the issue of sexual assault behind prison walls is brought to light. Female prisoners were being sexually violated and humiliated. Davis states throughout this passage that woman experience sexualy assault, before and after they enter the prison system. Personally, after reading this chapter and reading external sources, I feel that women became the targets for sexual abuse by an authority figure. Whomever commits these heinous acts are using their role of authority as a coverup to inflict pain on these individuals. In the prison writings of Kate Richards O’Hare, we see her share a view similar to Davis. O’Hare states, “I found that under the guise of punishment for crime, and in

Male and female prisons differ in some ways, but one thing that is the same is that the inmates suffer from depression, stress, and anxiety each day for the rest of their lives. It is hard to imagine what they face through everyday incarcerated or not. When prisoners are in jail, they have to deal with drama believe it or not. They might form groups determined by race and talk negative things about each other or think one race is better than another. Women prisons do this more often than men prisons. An example from the show Orange is the New Black of prison drama is when a prisoner stole a hand mirror from another prisoner. It is stupid things like that. They have to deal with the crappy food, crappy roommates if they can have one, and not being able to have the freedom. They have strict rules on when they can have visitors and when they can take a phone call. If you committed a crime that is super bad, then you do not get these privileges. When there time is up, they have to worry about where to go, finding a job, family, and more. Some of them come out of there and have no family to help them seek shelter and help them financially. Some just have to live on the streets for a bit until they have some money. It is very difficult to find a stable job with committing a crime on your record. They probably could get hired on at a fast food restaurant or at a factory, but they won’t make much to be

This article was by far one of the most interesting ones that, I have ever had the pleasure of reading. Many of these men and women face challenges in their normal day-to-day street life because they are apart of the LGBT community. The Los Angeles County Men's Jail segregates their transgender and gay inmates from the normal prison population so they do not risk violence or sexual assault. This program is called K6G unit. These men live in constant fear often times in their street life and more so in prison because many of the inmates have a strong prejudice against them in the prison. This unit was put in place for their safety and rights as an individual that they might not have in regular prison population.

The War on Drugs has led to an increase in the mass incarceration of people of color and minorities, which is a problem in the United States. In the past thirty years, the number of females jailed across the country, many of whom are poor with mental health and drug problems. The increase in the incarceration of females has had a devastating impact on their children, families and communities. This paper will describe the authors of Upper Bunkies Unit and Orange Is the New Black who wrote their respective books about the same prison, the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, Connecticut, a low-security female prison. Both books contain many themes, such as broken families, limited services available and substance abuse treatment. This paper will also explore many factors influencing the success or failure of incarcerated females in reintegrating after their release from prison. Literature will be used to provide insight into the lives of females behind bars by focusing on their well-being and resources available. In addition, the current trend in treatment, such as substance abuse and mental health treatments will be discussed. Lastly, collateral consequences will be explored.

American prisons have a disparity of minority inmate population, and one of the reasons this is so is because of the manner the judicial system operates. The investigator chose this topic because there are many African Americans and Hispanics that have been incarcerated for crimes they committed, as well as for crimes they didn’t commit, and because of their cultural background they were given severer sentencing. After performing the research the investigator found that many factors played a big part in the incarceration of minorities that included, ethnicity and gender. Although there is a high crime rate in minority areas, there are more